


Inuyasha: Come What May

by Amateur_Aries



Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: Bullying, Death, Demons, Elves, Escape, F/M, Fighting, Grief, Hope, Loss, Love, Mystery, PTSD, Sadness, Sesshomaru - Freeform, Survival, Suspense, War, anguish, betrothal, desparation, half demon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-04
Updated: 2017-12-04
Packaged: 2018-05-18 06:46:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 22,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5902381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amateur_Aries/pseuds/Amateur_Aries
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pre-quel to my Fanfic Inuyasha: Girl Lost In Time. The story of a mother and daughter, both elves, having escaped a war ravaged land that has destroyed their species and that end up washing up on the Western Coast of Japan where they are found by a demon lord. Unlike the previous lands, he doesn't want to hurt them but what DOES he want? This will be a short Fanfic with some chapters that will lead and connect to Inuyasha: Girl Lost In Time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prequel: From War

Disclaimer: I do not own the series or any of the characters within it. I do own the two elven characters and they will be seen within my book series that I am writing. Please do not take, steal or copy their characters in any way of form. Thank you. Also note: Sorry this took so long, you all have been waiting patiently for my update on Inuyasha: Girl Lost In Time and my TMNT Fanfic but I had came up with this idea four months ago and really wanted it to link properly so I was doing plenty of outlining to make sure! So I will be updating those others now that I have finally got through the process of finishing this first chapter. Thank you for being patient and feel free to leave comments below and I will be sure to respond!

 

200 years ago

 

      There is a soft splashing of waves that fills my dark mind; it's chilling and yet pleasant a giant leap from the repetitive lapping of angry water against wood. This slow coming and going is melodic in such a way I've almost forgotten about the last few months and for a second I thought I was back home in bed listening to my mother humming one of our peoples tunes. If it weren't for the growing aches, pains and burns of my body I would have fallen back to sleep.  
      The world has never returned to me in such a a slow tip toey way as it is right now but as my mind returns from the dreamy lands to reality I notice my body is not pressed against the hard splintery wood of the tiny row boat but that of cool, damp sand. The surface shapes to my thin frame sending shivers along my starving and dehydrated body while making a perfect cast from of it below.  
      I can't remember how long we have been out at sea? Maybe days...it could have been weeks.  
      Long enough though, for the sacks of food and water to run empty, our throats to dry, stomachs to wrinkle, our skin to redden and peel with absolutely no time to heal except the nightly hours when we spent hours with our eyes closed with no reprieve of sleep. Below us the row boat would rock reminding us of how raw the sun made us feel and how the longer the days were becoming.  
      But for the first time in days, while I watched the ocean life below the surface, I fell asleep with the sun beating on my back and a hand as fish food in the water. I was sure that it was my last moment. I knew I should have died.

     And maybe I have and this is heaven. The soothing waves at my numb toes promising land and giving me security that the war was won and it’s all over now.  
      Only that....one single thing is throwing off this possibility of freedom, the softest pattering of someones heart at my side. This is no mind games, I know this for sure, because there is no better sense on or in my body and I know it could never lie to me; it’s an elf's most precious gift given upon them when we are born next to our natural magic: our sense of hearing. It is the only thing I can truly rely on when all the hallucinations become to vivid to be distinguished as real or fake.  
      So good are my ears that I can tell by the beat of the heart and how it sounds against the rib bones what race, gender and if I focus hard enough, what blood type the person is.  
      Each thump of the heart is long, pauses for a brief second before the next beat follows suit, this song is familiar to me and I can tell now with the cloudiness of my exhaustion leaving me that it is my mother. Her heart is normally slow, never taking speed since our long lives don’t require such frequency but hers is a bit fast, tittering in an almost panic dance. Something must have alerted her.

     This brings me back to the light; heaven is not here and this is reality. The water at my toes turn icy and the breeze sends chills down my spine, I’m filled with a burst of energy I hadn’t felt in weeks. My eyes spring open and I half expect to find myself still on the dainty row boat with the sun beaming down on us with the gulls cawing above and water rushing into our boat from some hole.  
      But instead I find what I least expected.  
      Land.  
      The sand below me that I felt mold my shape is part of a large white beach. We’ve come to shore finally.  
      My arms struggle below me, rattling pathetically as I lift my top half off the ground and glance around at my new surroundings. Ahead of us are lucious colors, bright oranges, reds, browns, greens and yellows blanket the forest line that looks as if it expands for miles. Between us and the forest the white sand is powdery under my fingers and oddly glistens brilliantly underneath the sky full of sparkling stars that spread apart from around the full white moon and behind us, I hear the sea and how it subtles rocks the tail end of our tiny row boat that’s only partly pulled to shore.  
      When I look over our captor, its bone dry where the water doesn’t reach and it leaves me wondering how long have I been sleeping here for.  
      “Momma...?”  
      “Shh, my precious,” she whispers.

      I raise a brow when I look over to her just now noticing how close to my side she is, her forearms could practically touch mine if she wasn’t stiff. She sits with both her hands and feet burried in the cold sand below, her back straight and head pointed ahead of us. Her skin faintly glows, finally looking a bit normal now that she has been able to heal under the cover of darkness. Even with her skin more pink than olive pale she is still beautiful.  
      Long streams of thick wavy blonde locks frame her form and then makes a half halo around her on the sand. Her normally plump lips are dry and cracked but are parted.      She is thin and frail but her body still fills out her white dress in the perfect hour glass shape I used to hear the men in my village mention. They weren’t the only ones that watched her with admiration and want; all of our people referred to her as the goddess of beauty, and I, her child touched by darkness.  
      Unlike her angelic features, mine take on a different form. My skin is bit more on the olive tan side, my onyx hair falls straight to my hips with no crinkle of a wave or curl, and my eyes are a shade of emerald green that my mother would call her precious gems.  
      I heave the rest of myself up until I am on my knees which wobble below me. Releasing a relieved sigh I finally follow my mother’s line of sight to the forest line. From my peripherals I can see her ears twitching away searching the for whatever is unseen. 

      Taking a deep breath and swallowing back the pain that races through me when I do, I force my ears and eyes to focus on the forest in dire hope I can hear what she’s hearing. The sounds of soft waves and the breeze mixing together in my ears makes it hard for me to concentrate on the pitter pattering of forest animals, bugs or birds and  I’m so dehydrated it’s hard to see any other shapes besides the bright colors of the tree leaves and the shadows night has blanketed.  
      Even if I wasn’t this badly drained my senses aren’t as fine as my mother’s, hardly nine falls old - my body and senses have not matured to her level. So I hear nothing except for the cool, calm nature and not at all anything that would make me feel unsafe.  
      In a flash my mother is up on her feet and a split second later I feel her thin hand trap my thinner wrist before I am whipped from my knees and up to my weak feet. She tugs me close just in time for my legs to almost give out, both my hands collide with her waist, my fingers clenching and gripping to her torn white dress for support. My legs struggle beneath me, tired and sore, but that doesn’t stop her. With one sweeping movement she has me behind her but my hands fight back, dragging her dress along with me. She doesn’t seem bothered by this. In fact, as I look up at her, her eyes narrow aggressively and a snarl deepens her lips.  
      “Show yourself.” She demands in a deep tune that screams dominance. It runs chills down my spin. 

      It gets quiet. All the night sounds, the scowering of animals, the buzzing of bees and even the sound of the breeze silences.  
      I lean onto my right leg just enough to be able to peer around my mother’s waist. There, just beyond the forest line, I can see a blur of white. It’s form is hard to shape but whatever it is, it is tall and getting closer.  
      Whatever was left of my mother’s shaking form comes to a half. She stands still and strong like a defensive statue. A perfect guardian under the pale moonlight. As the form comes closer and closer, she lifts her her frail left hand up, palm facing the forest, “dare show us harm and I’ll have the Earth rip you limb from limb.”  
      The figure stops, there is a second of silence, before a deep voice thunders powerfully from the tree line. “I mean no harm, my lady.” Another second of silence. Both are still as the rooted trees. And then she gives in, slowly lowering her hand just a smidgen.  
      The white figure takes a step out from the forest and with very long strides he comes closer making it much easier for my eyes to adjust and see him. When he reaches the ten feet marker from us he stops and is now completely visible under the light of the moon.  
      He towers us in both length and muscle, fitting for the voice he lets out. His eyes are an unusual amber I’ve never seen with slitted pupil much like a cats; and like our ears, his are pointed but much closer to the size that of a humans. A single purple streak marks each cheek of his tan visage. Even with his white thick long hair tied up in a high pony tail its length out sizes my mothers whose when stand, reaches pass her rear end.

     The least unusual thing about this man has to be his outfit. Having just traveled through the large land of eastern asia I’ve seen plenty of outfits similar to the one he’s wearing, however, his has more of a regal-ness and elegance than I have seen throughout that land.  
      He wears a long sleeved white robe with matching baggy pants that stay put underneath the black an silver breast plate and waist plate, the breast plate has a spiky rim that hooks up and around his shoulders and layers down his left arm. A matching pauldron dresses his right arm as well. Two fluffy white tail like materials drag from behind his back from where his shoulders are.  
      He looks ready for battle with the two swords tied at his hips.  
      I know my mother catches sight of them when she begins tugging me further behind her again, I am still able to make out this man from inbetwen her hip and her right arm.  
      In response he lifts up his hands in a surrendering gesture but she refuses to relax. His amberish eyes wander curiously down at our boat and then back at her before falling to me.  
      His eyes could pierce but I dare not move or look away.  
      A small touch of a smile itches at the corner of his lips. “She must be your daughter.”  
      “Then you can understand why I am responding to your presence this way.” But I know it’s because of the war; because we’ve seen to many swords slung at us. 

      “I do, I have a son about her age.”  
      For a split second there is silence again. Only the wind dares to make even the slightest of a whistle. They eye one another, neither of them blinking and from my point of view, it doesn’t look like either of them are even breathing.  
      And then I see her break; all the aggression she kept held up against this man finally washes out of her and a calm returns to her weakened form smoothing out her beautiful face and lighting the tension in the air. She finally drops her hand in full and as she does he follows by kneeling down onto one knee becoming almost eye level with me.  
      His eyes return to me and the softest smile crosses his lips, “What’s your name?”  
      I am unsure if I should respond, my mother may be calm now but months of running from monsters and humans have left me wary to anyone. I glance up at my mother on the next move and she hesitantly nods with approval.  
      “Lahona.”

     “What a pretty name – fit for a pretty girl,” his smile widens just enough to show his white teeth, his canines are prominent, a little longer than the average and have a pointed tip. “And what interesting eyes you have.”  
      Instinctively I reach for my eyes touching the very tips of the almond shape they form and itching to rub them now that I realize they are dry.  
      “You’re no human and yet not a demon.” He continues observing, and though he’s looking at me his tune changes, I can tell he was really talking to my mother.  
      “We’re from the west,” she begins, still a little hesitant, she continues after she clears her throat. “Our people are known as Elves. A species, I am afraid, might have just become extinct.”  
      By her very words I can see a flash of memories in my mind of screaming, fire, rain and lightning, battering the forest we once called home and devouring the lives that lived within it. We only managed to escape on a whim, my mother has special abilities that allowed her to control the earth and wind just enough to prevent the flames from kissing us and throw the soldiers who were chasing us. I know if it weren’t for me, she would have stayed with her people, fought as hard as she could and died along with the other victims of war.  
      “Elves?” He questions with a rising brow.  
      “A race as old as time – born to magic- our souls are connected to nature in ways humans don’t understand. Unfortunately, that frightens them.” She glances down at me and tries to smile to lighten the mood but I can’t bare to smile back.

      The man stands up brushing the sand from his white pants and nodding to my mother. “Good thing I am not human,” he lets out a small laugh at some unseen joke. He suddenly stops and his face turns suddenly serious, not a smile or laugh turning shapes. “You said your species might be extinct, you being here obviously means its not. You must have escaped.”  
      My mother’s right hand touches mine, I can feel her shaking again; this time I can’t tell if it’s because she’s weak and tired or from the memories that are even replaying for me. But the longer she remains silent, staring off into the distance with a placid expression I can tell what is racing through her mind.  
      “There was a battle.” I state, earning a smile from the tall man.  
      “Did you protect your mother the entire way here?”  
      “No. I’m not strong enough yet.” I respond.  
      He glances back up at my mother the smile falling again back into the same serious expression he had shown seconds before. “You’ve washed up on my land, in my territory. I can promise you a home, food and protection if you’re willing to accept an offer.” Her lips part and her forehead crease as it does when she’s thinking, “What is the offer?”  
      There is a warmth behind the smile he raises now, “As I have mentioned before, I have a son of her age,” he waves his left hand down at me but his eyes don’t follow. “He’ll grow up to take over my territory, becoming a strong demon lord as I am. You’re daughter, I’m sure, will grow up as beautiful as you with just as much compassion and fight to protect her loved ones. My offer is to have them betrothed so that in the future they be married. She’ll have a strong protector who can also unsure the existance of your race with stronger genes and my son will have a beautiful, smart and natural survivor as your daughter – one suitable to rule my land as he would.”  
      Her eyes narrow and a scowl turns her lips, “What if she doesn’t want too, what if she doesn’t love him? I want her happy, not tied down because I’ve run out of options.”  
      I try to picture what his son must look like, how tall he must be, if he has the same white hair and amber eyes? Does he have two fluffy tails on his back too? And if he’ll be powerful why doesn’t he already have someone lined up for him? Could I really be with someone I don’t know?  
      I watch my mother as her scowl deepens and deepens. She’s starting to look skeleton-like and it worries me. We can’t go much longer like this. We can’t keep running – the world does has an edge and going through these foreign lands without knowing what is to come…I know we won’t make it much longer. We won’t survive and then our race will die on us running from our past.As if reading my mind, the man continues, “I’ll tell you what, if they do not become compatible and if she doesn’t love him as they grow. I’ll give you a place to live regardless but not with my protection. There are many demons in this land, all that want some sort of power, lust, envy or are just plain evil – all I know will look at your daughter and you as dinner or something…else. Perhaps by the time she’s old enough to decide if she loves him, you might know enough about demons to fend both of yourselves off.”  
      …Or …something else? What else is there but to be killed and eaten? Whatever it is, my mother knows, her face cringes and instead of a scowl a sickening frown falls and creases her entire face. She pales more so than before and her grip on my hand tightens. She even takes a step back, bumping me back myself and almost causing me to stumble and fall.  
      If I at least agree…we can have a place to live for now. A home, food, safety and my mother won’t look so frail and fragile and I won’t have to wake up wondering if not she’s dead at my side. I am so tired of fighting. I might be almost nine falls but my mother…she’s lived centuries. She deserves peace. I know right now I can’t protect and even if she was up to it, one shot of any of her abilities or powers would leave her unconscious.  
      Gathering all the strength I have I let go of my mother’s dress, tug from her reluctant hand and limp out from around her. “I'll do it.”  
      They both look startled down at me, I hear my mother at my side whisper my name but I choose to ignore it.  
      “Mom.” I pronounce. “We need help. We can’t keep fighting. We can’t keep running.”  
      I stare up at the man with dedicated pumping through me, giving me the only energy I have at the moment. He stares at my mother with the same startled expression he’d shown when I agreed and I can feel my mother staring down at me but with what emotion I have no intent to find out. I’ve decided this. This is my way in protecting my mother.  
      “Alright.” He says, “What is your name, my lady?”  
      “Linka…Queen of the forest elves, and you?”  
      He smiles. “Inutaisho.”  
  
  



	2. Chapter 1: Fireflies and Dirt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally, they are safe but now Lahona must face her Betrothal - Sesshomaru.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay, I have written to the end of this fanfic but I just now have gotten to type it up due to being ill and currently moving.

**Chapter One**

               

                We travel along a thin path between large trees as tall as the highest towers of the biggest castles; their trunks so thick and reddish brown that they stick out against the dark scenery. Scattered between these massive ancients are fireflies that dance like little bulbs of light over fields of flowers, even in the dark, their purple, pink, red and yellow stick out brilliantly.

                Inutaisho doesn’t blink at the sight of such beauty, it must be so regular for him that it no longer ignites a wondrous flame but my mother and I can’t help but stare in awe. The last time we’d seen such beauty was far before the war on our land – when nothing feared anything and life was allowed to live…and magic allowed to co-exist.

                Ahead of me, Inutaisho assists my mother with walking, her legs so beaten up from our long run has her wobbling in his hold, but he seems completely unbothered with her weight and instability. A single arm of his, wrapped around her petite waist, is all he needs to keep her up and stable against him.  He even smiles down at her every time few minutes just to reassure her that she isn’t a burden – something she worried about when he offered his help.

                I choose to ignore my own pain, my legs burn and ache all over, especially in the back of my calves but I don’t want to worry my mother anymore than she already is. With each step I take I make sure they are careful steps, a single trip could leave me on the ground for the rest of the night and I’d refuse any help to get up.

                The fireflies scatter from us when we come to an opening; dim yellowish lights stretch around the last few trees that are in our way and after rounding them I see a tiny palace, of sorts, just beyond a small field of grass and flowers. Personally, I wouldn’t call it a palace if it weren’t for the multitude of guards that are stationed around it or the elegant decorative wooden embellishes that crest the corners of the walls and doors. The size of it reminds me of a medium sized family home and wealthy merchant would own back in our lands.

                The design of the home is very eastern from what I’ve experienced so far within these lands: the walls are mostly white screens, so thin that even the lantern lights from within the building glows outside onto the tan wooden porch that borders the entirety of the house. The roof is curved upwards at the center, the stone material being mostly a dark grey. Well arranged stones stretch from the steps to the front of the house towards us, smooth and cool to the touch of our scab and blistered feet.

                The guards that stand straight and tall at every corner of the building smell and appear human, but I honestly can’t see them due to the thin leather armor that covers every inch of their bodies and the helmet that hides their faces. Even the thin strips on their helmets that allow them to breathe are so tiny that I can’t see through to their lips.

                Just smelling the human from here has the hairs on my body rising and heated chills rolling down my spine. Little voices in my head whisper, ‘run, run, you’re not safe.’ The glare I give to each one of them as we approach screams, ‘Stay away.’ But I can’t tell if they are even acknowledging me.

                We take the couple of steps with a slow stride, my mother needing help with every single one, she smiles delicately up at the guards who now come to her aid. I fight to keep from batting them away, I’ve seen the damage humans can cause – how they can burn down houses and massacre people all because they don’t understand something they don’t know.

                They back away when she’s up the stairs, residing back to their spots at the corners, not at all coming to my assistance though I don’t look like I require it.

                Inutaisho relieves my mother for just a second to open the main doors, they slide quietly and once open reveal a large rectangular room that is well light.

                The room isn’t much decorated, no real walls to hold paintings or decorations, in a corner to the right is a grouping of weapons that sit against the wall. Two screen doors are each side of the room from my left and right, and straight ahead is a lift that lines the entire opposite wall. It comes out just enough for two over sized pillows that are purple and gold in color. Upon one of the pillows sits a woman who is so finely dressed she could make for a goddess.

                Purple and white silk flows off her like a puddle, the designs similar to that of Inutaisho under robe. She also has similar purple streaks on her cheeks but her are just below the eyes and are smaller and a lighter shade, much like the shade of purple that kisses her lips and her eyelids. Her hair and ears match Inutaisho the most, tiny little pointed ears, much like our elven ones but far smaller, stick out from her hair. The long locks are so white it could make snow jealous, and even with her hair tied up in two pony tails on the back of her head, from where she is sitting, it still lies about the ground around her.

                “Unexpected guests,” she announces; she smiles but her amber eyes glower at my mother and I like we are the slime of the city. It doesn’t seem to phase Inutaisho. I don’t even think he notices – or maybe it’s normal.

                I close the sliding door behind us so Inutaisho can focus on getting my mother inside.    

                “They are on the run, I’ve offered them refugee and protection on account that this young one is betrothed to our son.”

                Her smile is gone from her lips when I turn back around and the glower is a vicious glare. The length of my ears fall with my discomfort, I keep near the door just in case I need to escape.

                She doesn’t know where to look, her eyes dart from Inutaisho to me, to my mother to me and back to Inutaisho. “Why to her?” her voice is thick with audible acid, but I can tell she’s biting back the majority of her anger.

                “She’s one of the last of her kind. Not human or demon and she is of his age.”

                Glad to be a commodity.

                Inutaisho pauses in the middle of the room, letting my mother go just enough where she can lean his weight against him but stand fully on her own. The woman doesn’t even seem bothered with the closeness they have, not that it’s any suspicious.

                Instead she’s observing me, eyes probing into the depths of my very soul so much my back meets the screen wall behind me, and though my body is acting afraid, I don’t feel it in my heart. Maybe it’s from all the running and the exhaustion, or maybe it’s from me starving so much I can’t even tell which organ is hurting the most anymore. She stares at me for what seems like minutes and we all remain silence under our held breaths.

                The fakest of smiles grows on her lips, “Of course, that depends on what Sesshomaru has to say.”

                Sesshomaru must be their son, the one I am to marry when I am of age. It’s a unique name but with how his mother is acting I only see him as a momma’s boy now.

                “No.” Inutaisho is quick to answer, earning an outraged look from the lady. “These are the decisions of a demon lord, not children.”

                “He will be a demon lord!” She snaps back, all restraint is broken, she comes to her knees and slams her fragile looking hands down on the ledge. For a second I could have sworn I saw red in her eyes, and even so much as her face narrowing inhumanly but I blink…and it’s back to normal.

                “Until then, decisions are made for him.” He says with the utmost calm. A low, feminine growl lingers from her as she breathes in and out. This goes on for a few seconds and it’s Inutaisho who breaks it. He smiles down at my mother, as if there is no care in the world, “My lady, I have forgotten introduction. Forgive me, this is my wife – Lady Kimi,” He turns his attention at his wife but his eyes aren’t looking at her. They are looking pass her. “Kimi, this is Queen Linka and Princess Lahona. They will be honored as we are while they are living in our home.”

                “We don’t mean to intrude, really, we can find our own way…” My mother persists; she tries to lean her weight from Inutaisho but when she does her legs wobble so much she falls to her left knee. I am at her side the moment it happens, forgetting my bodily fears and pains.

                “Mom…”I whisper, my hands at her shoulders but she waves me down.

                Inutaisho kneels to one knee at her side, “No,” his voice is soft and heartwarming. “No,” he repeats, as he wraps his arm back around her and becomes her stilt again. She comes to a stand when he does. “The deal has been made. This will be food for him and it will be good for her. Have no worries or fears here.”

 

\-----*

 

                I can’t sleep. The room is large and empty, leaving me feeling small and insecure as I lay in the middle of the room on a skinny mat. My head throbs from the uncommon smells of pine and juniper. Normally these smells would be fine to me but being in a new environment has heightened all my senses.

                Beside me my mother sleeps soundlessly and like a log, once she was down she was gone – probably the first time she’s felt safe enough to actually have a peaceful sleep since the war began.

                I am happy for her, I am also happy my stomach no longer aches. The moment we were free from Lady Kimi we got to eat new delicacies I’ve never experienced like curry and sushi. Every dish that the single servant brought out was cleared in minutes. We didn’t give ourselves time to breathe but it felt so right and good…

                But when we finally got to our room and lay down, I became restless. I want to explore, feed my curiosity. This is a whole new land with new plants, animals and beliefs. Different smells, sights and experiences are ready to be open to me. The trees just outside of the screen door that leads to the porch, speak a foreign language, their leaves dance differently to the wind.

                I want to learn that language and that dance.

                I roll onto my side towards the door, glancing over my shoulder where my mother stirs but doesn’t wake. Under my weight, my arms tremble as I push myself up to my feet and walk like a new born child to the sliding door. The new clothes we were given fits me so tightly that my lower legs barely have enough slack to walk normally. I have to take small steps or risk becoming a worm on the floor.

                My fingers clutch the sliding door and it glides open silently, letting in a draft of cool breeze I didn’t feel before. All around the landscape a soft buzzing can be heard, the flapping of minuscule wings of fireflies and midnight bugs. There is a chirp or two from birds that watch over their babies in their nests but all else is silent and sleeping.

                Shuffling to the edge of the porch, fields of grass and flowers stretch towards the tree line that encircles the home and with most of the lanterns blown out; the fireflies are all that provide light other than the moon that washes over the building.

                The moon should be asleep in a few hours and the sun will be waking.

                My eyes drop from the forest ahead to the ground just below the porch, there the dirt is reddish brown and full of the nutrients needed to probably make an amazing garden with constantly fresh vegetables. It looks as soft as flour and with the breeze; I can only imagine how cool it would feel in-between my toes.

                I love the feeling of dirt in-between my toes, not that wet mud dirt, but the real dry soft garden dirt that is like a bed for your feet. It cools every inch of you with just the lightest touch and refreshes your body to soothe all your pains. My toes curl against the hard wood of the porch, I bite my bottom lip as the urge grows the more I dwell on it. But if I dare step into that ground, I will for sure mess up this kimono and Lady Kimi is already angry about the betrothal.

                Maybe if I just touch it with my fingers the urge will go away….I mean, come on, when was the last time I actually got to enjoy nature and all its splendors?

                My feet kick back and forth between the tight cloths but with no avail. The kimono refuses to loosen up; if I am to touch that dirt I must go through some level of pain. Taking a deep breath and closing my eyes, I prepare for impact. I drop my legs under me and fall to my knees painfully; I bite back the groan that rolls through me and almost forget that I made a boom with my landing.

                I glance around behind slightly opened eyes and listen for any sound of waking peoples. Nothing.

                Okay. Safe.

                Ignoring the pain that runs through my legs, I stretch forward with my left hand and reach for the dirt down below. The kimono sleeve pulls from my lower arm revealing pale, taut skin that is covered in bruises and scratches, I frown at the sight. I haven’t had a good look at myself since the day I left home. I didn’t realize I was this beaten up and I haven’t even seen the rest of me…

                Shaking my head I refocus on my main target, with my finger tips just an inch away I can already feel the coolness the dirt has to offer, it spreads tiny goose bumps up my arm and fills me with an earthy rejuvenation. It’s almost just enough to relax my aching wounds…

                “I’m betrothed to this…?”

                My heart leaps to my throat and I freeze into a living statue. Eyes wide and ears perked, I was sure I didn’t hear any footsteps – I am sure I would have – was I too focused on the dang dirt? Slowly, I tear my eyes from the ground that’s now centimeters away and look over my shoulder at the young boy who’s just a few feet away.

                Suddenly, all the fear drains from me and I pull my hand from its reaching grasp to hop my body into his direction.

                He’s maybe a year or two older than I am and looks like the perfect mixture of both his parents. He has long silvery hair that sways behind him, it reaches just pass it hips, tiny pointed ears hold back any fly away locks. He has an angular face that only adds deepness to his already sharply glaring amber eyes and makes the two purple streaks that mark both of his cheeks looks menacing even with his child-like size.  

                Regardless of his strict and mean he looks, I can’t help but stare at the concentrated fluffy mass that rounds his right shoulder and that dangles down to his feet. It meshes well with the white and red kimono outfit he is wearing. I wouldn’t know what to call it, white baggy pants with a tied shirt that has kimono like sleeves and opening. This land has strange attires.

                “Is that your tail?” I nod to the fluffy mass. I kind of want to touch it. It looks soft. I wonder if it’s made of fur, is it real or fake?

                His eyes narrow at my question.

                “I’m sorry,” I frown, “And this,” I point to myself; I begin my struggle mid-sentence to stand back up. My feet and calves hardly helping when my tight kimono refuses to let up, I stumble forward and backward awkwardly in front of my intended until I am finally standing once again. Trying to play it cool by brushing myself off, I continue, “This one is an elven girl, which my name is Lahona. You must be Sesshomaru.”

                “It’s Lord Sesshomaru to a weakling like you.” The narrowness of his eyes says it all, he doesn’t like me already.

                My frown drops even lower.

                I’d rather be rolling around in the dirt, kimono and all, than to be glared at by someone my age who doesn’t even know me and already calling me names. Doesn’t sound that bad of an idea though….Instinctively, my head rolls to my left shoulder and my eyes gaze upon the Earth that lies invitingly there. But somehow…I still don’t feel better at the idea.

                “In my kingdom no one thought I was weak.”

                And no one was mean and there weren’t any bullies. My people had splendidly long lives that they didn’t waste on negativity. They spent it on honing old and new skills and being amongst nature.

                “Was this the same Kingdom that was destroyed?”

                The words came out so naturally for him…and is so raw for me. I can still smell the fire, taste the blood, hear the thundering boom of horse hooves and thunder, I can still see the humans as the watch my people burn behind a wall of fire – I can still see them, my people, melting away, our history gone, or extinction. I can still feel that fire burning my skin as it tried to reach for me…as it tried to lick my flesh …as it failed when I was taken away.

                “You two should be in bed.” This voice comes from behind me. It’s a crackling but loud voice, I turn my head to spot one of the many human guards standing close by me and just as I spot him he reaches for my shoulder.

                My feet stumble quickly forward to reject his touch, not even realizing that I am not even inches away at Sesshomaru’s side until I smell the scent of rain and bark….I always loved that mixture. It always reminded me that life can always spring up.

                Being this close to the little demon lord has me see that though he’s older than me by a year or two, he’s still a good foot and foot taller than me and the level of maturity on his face is un-canning. Even now, being this close his expression is resentful and yet, calm with an edgy glare that demands submissiveness – but he’s not looking at me.

                His eyes are the guard.

                Without being able to see under the helmet I can’t tell what the guard is doing or what he’s expressing. He remains still, almost too still, and straight like a board. A few minutes of just glowering in silence, and then the guard kicks his boots together with a thud, turns on his heels and marches off, much louder than before when I didn’t hear him.

                My heart pounds like a drum in my chest, I can’t tell if it’s from fear or adrenaline or both but the hate is all the same. “I might be weak…but humans…” I mumble. I can’t say the words, the memories will try to resurface and I won’t fall prisoner again today to my own mind.

                His attention turns back to me with the same cold glare he gave the guard but I won’t submit like a pet or a servant. I smile instead, faint and weak as it is, and turn from him to scuttle back inside.


	3. Chapter 2: Blood and Lightning

**Chapter 2**

                The fields have more color to them than what I saw last night and with only a few flowers I can recognize out of the many I can’t. Pinks, whites, baby blues, bright greens and even a few reds here and there dot most the land even beyond the tree line. The air is fresh, dewy and smells of sap, pine, wet leaves and blossoms. The dirt at my feet is just as refreshing as I thought it would be and with every step I don’t feel a shutter of pain but instead an embracement.

                I’ve wandered most the yard, keeping from going inside to the best of my ability since I don’t want to meet up with Lady Kimi unless I absolutely need too.

                Even so, this is the most freedom I’ve felt in a long time and finally…I don’t have any fear wrapping its fingers around me.

                Kneeling down, I pluck a daisy to add to my collection. I lean back up and start to string the flower by its stem into the flower crown I am shaping. The crown isn’t exactly circular and is more of an awkward oval, then again I was five the last time I had made one of these and I wasn’t good then either.

                The sun just barely pours over the tree tops, warming my beaten skin and awakening me from the sleepless night I had. I still feel so much better than I did since before last night, especially after breakfast.

                Most of the meal was left in silence and full of tension, my mother and I sat across the table from the Lord, Lady and their son, and being that we are not demons, we were the only ones that ate a normal meal. The three ate meals of raw meat that was nicely cut to resemble what they called ‘tataki.’ Instead of eating with our fingers this time, we tried the utensils they provided us which are two thin sticks.

                Lady Kimi glowered at me when I struggled constantly with the sticks dropping my food with everything I picked up and sometimes not even having them reach my mouth before it’d fall to my lap. On the other hand, my mother had to just watch them use the sticks for a few minutes before she was able to do it with ease. It left me frustrated. I just wanted to eat.

                After a while I didn’t care what kind of looks I earned from Lady Kimi, I started to pick at my food with my fingers – can you blame me? I never want to starve again.

                The best part of the morning though – other than my escape into the field – was getting out of that tight kimono and into another that allowed my legs to slip out of the bottom without exposing too much. I am able to run, jump, slip and fall and not even have to worry about getting it dirty. And I did so immediately. The second she was done tying my obi I ran out the screen door to my freedom and ever since I’ve been plucking random flowers in full attempt to keep from wondering into the forest.

                That was about an hour ago.

                Unfortunately with every step I take I’m noticing I’ve gotten closer and closer to the forest. It’s dark and mysterious but not scary or creepy, but it feeds my curiosity. I know if I start adventuring into the thicket, I’d get lost.

                I don’t know these lands; I don’t speak the trees language or know the animals. Not yet at least. It’s a slow process. I have to listen to the wind as it waltzes with the leaves, I have to listen to the way the rain hits their trunks and how the animals scurry up and down them. Tree listening is a very deep skill and once it’s learned, tracking becomes an easy skill to master.

                You see…the trees see and know everything. They are everywhere, communicate with each other and the most important of the elements, earth, water and air. Trees can warn of danger, protect from harm and tell you how to get home.  Most don’t listen now a day. With every gust of wind I learn a little from the howls the trees make….

                It also makes it incredibly hard for me to resist running off into the woods.

                I stare in-between the wide trunks into the world that’s open to me, my fingers fiddling impatiently just to bolt. I peek back at the palace;  on the porch in front of an open sliding door sits Sesshomaru. He followed me out here after I was let loose, but instead of wandering and playing, he sat on his butt and hasn’t gotten up yet.

                His eyes are far less intimidating now that I can see him clearly and he isn’t glowering at me like was last night but he hasn’t said a word to me either. At least he’s not calling me names.

                “You’re dad is very nice.” I turn slightly towards him; I pick another flower and start to add it to the crown.

                “You’re mother and you survived, I’m assuming your father didn’t?”

                “Straight to the point I see,” I half smile, this is going to my life I guess, “and I really hope not.” When he doesn’t reply and his eyes don’t change expression, I feel it is only right to explain so we’re not left in tension. “My father was a demon. Abusive and power hungry. From what I was told he was only with my mother so he could rule over our people. I was never told what his intentions were but my mom found out and banished him for whatever the reason. I was told she was able to kick him out of this dimension.” I shrug nonchalantly. I was young when all that happened, I can hardly remember his face but what I do remember was his eyes and how red they were. They would glow even in the darkest of night and would liquidity like blood when he was angry.

                Mom doesn’t talk about him much.

                “You’re a half demon.”

                “Nope. Full bloodied elf. I knew this Elven mage who studied in the likes of the body and mind. He’d ramble on about his research and I’d just sit there listening for hours while my mother talked politics with her group of people. He explained it once to me when I asked why I wasn’t like my dad…He said that Elves had a superior gene chemistry. Unique.

                My dad may have been demon but it’s rare for an elf to pass down a mixed gene. However, I still inherit other traits from him like his powers and bodily features like hair color. It’s the same way if my mom got with a human. Just she would have had a higher chance birthing a human baby, or even a half human. Something to do with the elf gene and demon gene both being really strong and one always winning over the other.”

                Maybe I spent too much time with Andruil. He was far more interesting than the people my mother hung around with. I don’t think I’ll ever grow into the type of intellect she is. When I look at Sesshomaru I catch a glimpse of interest on his face before he realizes I am looking and it clears away.

                “I can’t believe….though…beautiful…but….” The voice is low, and at a distance away where I can just barely pick them up as whispers. I cock my head towards the direction the voice is coming from which is within the woods and listen.

                “Can’t….he’s here….” Another voice, they are both male. Though I can’t pick up the full conversation, it sounds suspicious so far, my curious nature only grows. I can be silent enough to snoop and if I don’t go to far in I won’t lose my way….

                I glance back at Sesshomaru, but he’s no longer on the porch and the sliding door is closed. He must have gone back inside.

                “When….” They continue, perking my interest again.

                I nibble on my bottom lip and turn back to the woods. Hesitantly at first, I take careful steps but once I pass the first couple of trees I propel into a sprint. My heart races, the world melts into blurry colors of green, reds and browns, the air fills with sap and bark, and my feet flutter against the leafy floor as silent as a doe even with my quick speed.

                Yes….Yes. This is what I needed, adventure, fulfillment. Intrigue.

                I slow to a stop when I get around the diameter the voices should have been coming from but ever since I entered the woods I hadn’t heard them. My eyes narrow, piercing around trees far and wide, with every step I take now precise, silent and careful. My ears twitch at the sides of my head trying to pick up the waves made from movement or voices.

                Nothing….

                Another two minutes pass and I finally come to a stop. Trees and ferns flourish around  me, none of the likes that I can recognize. I begin to frown: there should be a breeze….rustling of branches….the sound of animals….chirping of birds…..Nothing.

                There is a pit that starts to grow inside of me; my heart no longer beats to the sound of adventure but instead of sudden realization.

                I am alone.

                In the middle of no where.

                In a foreign land.

                A shiver runs down my back tingling my skin and giving me goose bumps. Behind me, where the sun’s light touches my skin, is abruptly blocked and I am blanketed in a shadow. That pit doubles in size.

                “Well, well.” A voice exclaims, it’s one of the voices I heard before.

                “What do we have here?” Says the second finally.

                I don’t feel curious anymore…Just overwhelming, heart stopping fear….The worse part of it all is…I should have been able to hear them….

                Their shadows grow taller and taller the closer they come -  the more I am being dragged back to that day….They were burning….smoke covered the sun even in the morning after we escaped…it choked us in darkness.

                Cautiously I turn towards the shadows, when my eyes lay on them my stomach drops to my feet. It is two of the guards that work at the palace. Two of the human guards. They are mountains to me and I am just a flower in size. I don’t know if it’s them being so close or that they are smiling so wide, but I can actually see their teeth behind the thin breathing holes. They are yellow and brown…

                That’s not normal…I step back in reaction, ears falling low and it feels like my eyes are going to pop out of my head from how wide they are but I’m too scared to close them.

With every step I take back, they take one forward to fill the gap.

“Look how terrified she is.” Points the one on the right, he’s a little taller than the one on the left.

My hands twist and tear at the crown I spent an hour making, the flowers are crumbling up and dying in my grasp the more I fear. I release them from my hands and they drop onto my bare feet now brown in color and dry of life. Behind their helmets I can see their smiles twisting into ugly grins. I want to run but I’m so scared I can’t find the proper footing to even step back without stumbling.

“Should we have our fun?” The one on the left suggests.

“All we can do is beat and kill her. If we do anything else the Lord will be able to smell it and find us.”

The pit becomes a lump in my throat. I know exactly what he was suggesting….I saw it happen during the attack, human men that were thirsty for blood and innocence, became savage and raped the weak in the middle of the battle just to show their foes they don’t care what they take – it would be taken anyhow.

Tears well up in my wide green eyes, stinging and blurring my vision as I responsively shake my head to their words, all I can mutter out is the only thing that rings through my head, “Mommy….” I can only hope and pray, that somehow she’d be summoned up from just that little word.

“Don’t worry.” The right chuckles.

“She’s next.” The words are menacing and dark, so twisted….and from my left I glimpse a balled up fist rushing towards me.

 

\-----*

 

                “Lahona.”

                My name…it sounds far away and impassive. All I see is darkness but off in the distance I can just barely make out the return of the world. It’s slow and unbecoming because with every little bit that comes, so does reality.

                Like the excruciating pain all over my body, in and out, the taste of metal in my mouth, the warm wetness on my face and head. I am too young to know that the world and its reality is a cruel one. Why did I have to go through war…why did I have to learn so much at so young.

                “Wake up.”

                The darkness subsides quicker and quicker until I am left in a shadow light that filters over the real world. I attempt to open my eyes and only one follows. Above me is an unexpected sight: Sesshomaru. For a split moment, I could have sworn I saw worry in his eyes but that could be just me.

                My head is throbbing.

                ‘She’s next.’ Rolls around in my mind like a ghost; it’s the last thing I can remember.

                Underneath it all I can sense the worry and panic, my body wants to jolt up but I am stuck in place from the weight of my injuries. I fleetingly look around in search of the two guards and notice instead that Sesshomaru is carrying me in his arms. My head rests on his fluffy mass.

                Real fur. It smells like pine.

                “Where are they?” my voice is crocked and broken, a gurgle in comparison. I’ll be surprised if he understood it.

                “I killed them.” He exclaims. So calm that I have to watch him for minutes, half expecting him to give me the real news that they got away, or he found me like this and they were gone. That he lied to me just to comfort me. But he doesn’t say anything. He is serious.

                He killed them.

                Good.

                “I leave you for one minute and you nearly get yourself killed.” He doesn’t look at me while he talks, I wonder why. Is he ashamed of me? He’s right though, I was dumb following voices into the woods – I couldn’t control my curiosity and it nearly got me killed. I should have seen it coming, it didn’t sound like they were talking about anything good, I should have gone straight to Inutaisho.

                A breathy sigh leaves me but a pain so agonizing shoots through my lungs that a groan follows that only hurts my throat and back more. My body falls further into a limp in his arms, but he doesn’t seem to notice the extra weight. He’s stronger than he looks. I fit perfectly in his arms, just well enough where I can rest against him and hear the quiet and slow beat of his heart. I am glad – it’s not frozen in ice.

                “You’re very strong; you’re going to be a very powerful demon lord.”

                “That means nothing if I have a weak wife not worth of her position.” Always quick to reply.

                The frown that crosses my face doesn’t just curse my lips; I can feel it in my soul…

 

\---*

 

                We stay silent the rest of the way to the palace. I didn’t know I had gone so far away from the safety of the fields. When we break through the last bit of trees I see our home– and Inutaisho…and my mother, standing on the porch waiting for us.

                The horror on my mother’s face exceeds anything I’ve ever seen even during the war. Her eyes are wide with absolute terror and her mouth is gaping. Instantly I begin to weep, caught in-between fearing I am going to be yelled at and feeling ashamed of myself for getting into this mess. She rushes toward us so swift and unexpectedly that instead of being gentle; she rips me from Sesshomaru’s arms.

                Ignoring the pain becomes a battle not worth fighting, the second she takes me the pain doubles.

Just put me back…Everything hurts…

“What happened?!” Her eyes don’t leave me. They calculate every inch of what is visible. I can’t answer; I have to bite back from opening my mouth unless slurs of agony and pain will only be heard. She doesn’t wait for an answer anyhow, she rushes us inside and takes me immediately into our room where she gingerly lies me down on the white mat we call bed.

She kneels beside me and starts to glide her hands over my body, an action she used to do whenever she had to heal the broken and ill. She had a great reputation of being a healer…Best in our kingdom. Her hands would turn green and the green would rain upon their flesh…

But for me….No green sparks.

I don’t know what this means. She’s the most powerful person I know, the energy that comes from her interested demon lords for years….So why isn’t it working?

“No…No…” She repeats. Frustration and confusion twists on her face, she turns her palms to herself to examine them, but turns them back to me to try again.

Nothing.

She looks over her shoulder at the open door, standing there is Sesshomaru and his father. As usual, Sesshomaru is expressionless but covered in my blood, the white of his fluffy fur is red and pink. I ruined it. He’ll never forgive me.

Inutaisho has a soft sadness about him that I haven’t seen a demon show ever.

“We were supposed to be safe here.” She hisses at him.

A rush of anger bites through my pain, “Mom!” I snap, an audible growl of pain leaves me when I do. All eyes are upon me the second the word comes out. I understand why she’s angry …but, “I went by myself. I was ignorant, he can’t watch me every second of every day he has his own family. Besides, it was his guards, I overheard them talking in the woods about something I couldn’t add up. It sounded suspicious to me; I wanted to help by finding out what.”

The words flow out of me without a thought to process; I am to blame for my own incident but as my words linger everyones faces twist in confusion. My mother’s is caught between frustration and puzzlement; we’ve been through enough with humans to be paranoid but she’s always been open-minded and hopeful.

Sesshomaru is the only one whose expression hasn’t changed by much, there is the slightest movement of his brows that turns his face into one of slight fury but as always, it washes away when my eyes set on his.

                Inutaisho appears to be the most shocked. Putting faith and his family in the protection and guard of human soldiers must have been a big commitment for him. Personally, I don’t know why he needs human guards to protect his demon family; they are far more powerful than the humans that protect them.

                Maybe it is out of pity? Maybe the humans have no homes or jobs? Who knows except for him.

                “Is this true Sesshomaru?” His father asks; his amber eyes remain on me with a brief uncertainty to trust the little nine year old girl.

                “Yes.” He replies, “I destroyed them.”

                My mother’s face tangles in new emotions mixed with her old, shock and disbelief now play her face. “But you’re just a kid.” Her head snaps in his direction, blue eyes wide and mouth slightly parted.

                “I’m a demon.” Is all he replies with?

                Inutaisho places a hand on his son’s shoulder, a tiny small hooks the corner of his lip. Somehow, through all the pain – my heart flutters.

 

\---*

 

                Waking up is the single hardest thing I’ve done is a long time. All day and night every limb of mine was restless, especially after they were wrapped and patched up to prevent anymore bloodless and to help the process of my bones repairing. It irks me.

                I was stuck the entire time on my back staring up at the white ceiling while the flames of the lanterns played the same stories. They’d dance back and forth like the gypsies in our land, occasionally knights and men would fight in the shadows for a nameless battle. Really, I wanted it all to stop. I don’t like fire.

                The worse part of being stuck on my back was being hand fed, being probed with veggies I don’t care much about while my mother sighed every five minutes when she looked over my broken body. She fell asleep with her hand on my chest, palm down where my heart beats – I am sure it comforted her to know it still pitter patters inside of me regardless of how bored I am.

                When I did fall asleep, nightmares were the first to greet me with shadowy figures battling out much like the lantern fire’s stories. Swords would raise and collide, the shadows would jump back and forth, the sounds of clanging and groans would echo and the loudest of all things would be the voice that repeats behind the scenes. ‘She’s next.’ ‘She’s next.’ ‘She’s next.’

                Over and over again. Each time just as dark, cold and chilling as the first.

                I’d wake up in a sweat not even an hour later, wondering if I had truly slept or if the fire was trying to tell me something.

                After that – I couldn’t sleep.

                Outside of the room I could just barely hear the integration of the guards. No one knew anything of what I had heard…or even of the men that had beaten me. Playing it off as if they never even existed and that it was just a story of a little girl that has the Lord all wrapped up in paranoia. This made me so angry that I wanted to scream but what good would that do?

                Once the sun started to rise, blurring the darkness and light into an awkward misty grey, I could start smelling the flowers blossoming from the crack of the sliding door my mother left open for me last night. Cool damp air washed in and over my exposed toes and I am all too surprised to be able to feel them.             

                The cooks are at work, clattering pans and chopping up food, some house maids rush about, their patting feet meeting the mat below with an almost eerie swiftness. My mother wakes soon after, less concern and worry on her face when she’s able to re-dress my wounds.

                “Almost all healed…Thank the spirits that you are an elf.” She kisses my forehead, and leaves the room. I am sure she’s off to breakfast.

                “Almost healed…” I repeat after she’s left for a few minutes.

                I glance around the room suspiciously. When I know no one is in the hall to the left of the room and no one is on the porch on the right I start to move my fingers.

                Every finger moves with the thought of the action, none are broken. Slowly, I lift my arms testing my strength. They are definitely weak but not un-moving. My toes soon follow and then my legs, all slow but not paralyzed.

                With a deep breath and closing my eyes, I throw myself into a roll and make it onto my belly with a small groan. I stay still – listening for anyone but when silence is all the follows, I lift myself up to my knees and hands.

                Bruises and nearly healed cuts decorate my arms, hands and fingers from where I can see. I can’t imagine how the rest of me looks.

                Crawling to the cracked sliding door, I use my right hand to push it open where I am exposed to the cool, fresh morning air. I take a long, deep breath and with all the scents of morning life that follows I feel re-energized.

                Time for the real fight.

                Using the door frame I start to climb my way to my feet. Pain shakes my limbs agonizingly, every bone trembles but I refuse to fall. I don’t want to be in bed all day. I’ll do anything just to escape this room…

                Beneath me, my legs buckle into place and I stand up straight. A wide grin burns my bruised cheeks but I am just so happy I am able to stand that I don’t care about the feeling of pain that runs through me.

                Too weak to lift my feet, I shuffle my way out onto the porch, all my muscle spasm, causing my body to twitch here and there in the most uncomfortable of ways but it’s all worth it when I feel the breeze chill the spasms back into relaxation. I sigh in relief.

_Cling, cling, cling_

My ears twitch up and down at the sound of metal clashing with metal. It reminds me of the nightmare I had and the night war broke loose, but somehow I am not afraid. I tilt my head to the right where the sound is coming from. And another string of clings and clangs can be heard.

They sound slow and calculated, practiced moves. Not enough at all to even call it a fight between children.

It’s coming from the back of the palace, where the field ends and turns into an empty space full of thinly cut grass and a fountain in the right corner. When I saw it yesterday, it reminded me of a meditating area where someone can sit and just listen to nature. Never had I thought such noises would erupt there.

But now I am curious.

I start to shuffle my way down the porch, pathetically trying to get on my toes to lower the sounds of me coming but it fails I am returned to my simple shuffling. I suppose there is no point in trying to be sneaky in a place I am supposed to call home.

Half way down the porch, I start feeling weak, I throw my right hand out to the screen walls for support on the rest of the way to the back and when I reach the corner I peer to the two who are making all the noises.

Feet from the porch is Sesshomaru and Inutaisho; both are standing tall, eyes on each other with a fierce intention, and blades of weak steel in their right hands. Seconds pass of them just staring, calculating the others’ next move….

And then Sesshomaru lurches forward with speed so fast he blurs into a white wave. His father just smiles, unmoved at his son’s amazing swiftness and with the easiest movement he deflects every attack his son throws at him, causing the clings and clangs I heard before.

Both my hands clutch at the corner of the building with anticipation. I am not accustomed to Sesshomaru’s speed or even Inutaisho’s quickness to defend. The demon lord moves so elegantly with his son that it doesn’t even look like practice but a well thought out dance.

                “It’s not about speed, Sesshomaru, it’s about tactics. Think about who your opponent is – his strength and weaknesses, where he could go next. You have to be one mind and soul with your weapon.”

                Sesshomaru doesn’t pause, his slashes become like hacks instead of actual sword play the longer his father talks. He comes wild and impulsive. Even I know to slow down and I have always preferred the bow.

                Inutaisho’s expression turns sad and mournful, “There was nothing we could have done, Sesshomaru, we had no idea they would attack.”

                Attack? Was there another mutiny? It must have not been near the palace otherwise my mother would ha-

                Sesshomaru slows down to an abrupt halt and even with all that speed, and all those actions, he’s not even breathing as if he had any trouble. His stamina must be a thing of legend.

                He’s angry though, his eyes are narrow and piercing like daggers up at his father.

                “I’m sorry.” Inutaisho sighs.

                “Sir!” A guard announces from the middle of the porch to my right. My eyes narrow at the soldier, because once again, I didn’t hear him coming. How are these humans so damn quiet? I’m a bloody elf, my ears are supposed to hear miles away if I focus just a tiny bit, but a few measly feet away should be a given!

                With his eyes still piercing, Sesshomaru turns his attention to the guard just as his father does. The guard waits and only continues after Inutaisho gives him a nod of approval.

                “You’re wife, along with a small council of demon lords; wish to speak with you about an incoming army from the North.”

                Inutaisho smiles once again, a wide toothy grin, four sharp canines glisten in the morning light – just a reminder that he is after all a demon. “Time to handle yet another situation. Misa, practice with Sesshomaru, maybe challenging a human will force him to slow down. Sesshomaru, no killing this one.” He turns to each as he speaks to them, sheathing his sword to one of the many hilts at his side.

                In seconds he’s inside, swift and quiet like the morning breeze. The guard waits, still as a statue until his Lord is fully out of view before stepping down off the porch and to Inutaisho’s recent place.

                “I heard you killed two guards yesterday.” Misa, the guard, acknowledges.

                Immediately Sesshomaru dashes at the guard, sword at his side and is a white blur in milliseconds. I can just barely keep my eyes on him but somehow, Misa was able to deflect Sesshomaru’s incoming swing even with him having to unsheathe his blade. He chuckles in amusement, twirls his thin bladed katana with his wrist and takes position for more of Sesshomaru’s attacks.

                Something is off. Nothing is adding up on these human guards. They are too quiet – too quick. Let’s not forget, they never take off their helmets that I have at least seen.

                “The two you killed, they were my friends. I knew them since I was a babe.” His accent is off, it slurs almost like a hiss. I lean forward to listen more to the change when I hear Sesshomaru growl, a glint of red can be seen in his eyes blurring with the white.

                “They assaulted my fiancée!” He growls, ferociously.

                My heart skips a beat, I can feel it in my throat, and feel my cheeks heating like hot stone.

                I thought he hated me…

                “She’s just a brat. You’ve only known her, for what – two days?” He laughs yet again. His laughter brings me back to reality…He mentioned he knew those guards…when earlier all the guards claimed to have not known either of them.

                Another growl rips through Sesshomaru, it gurgles into a long heated hiss. This time with Sesshomaru brute attack, instead of deflecting the blade Misa catches it mid air bare handedly. He steps to the side ever so slightly and kicks Sesshomaru hard in the stomach.

                The force of the kick is so strong it sends Sesshomaru into the air and tumbling off onto the ground to my left. He lays there motionless, eyes reverting back to their normal amber color and his breathing hard and quick.

                Misa chucks Sesshomaru’s sword behind him, it skids across the ground and into the woods, far out of reach from Sesshomaru. “What do you say, little lord, an eye for an eye?”

                The guard swings his own blade behind him, gets into a swinging position and with incredible speed I’ve never seen a human use, rushes towards the fallen demon.

                A surge of rage pools within me, before I know it, I’ve managed to get between the two of them with my back facing Sesshomaru and my eyes up at the guard. Without my control, my left hand raises up at the guard, whose still incoming regardless I’m in his way.

                Out from my palm and below Misa’s feet, sparks begin to ignite, thunder rumbles the ground. My eyes narrow with the growing of my rage, and just as I squint into Misa’s eyes, lightning shatters the pale blue sky and an earsplitting boom follows.

                Three things happen all at once…

                The ground shakes so badly that the trees and palace surrounding us quite literally moves as if they are being electrocuted.

                Misa is no longer of human shape but is burning and melting into a skeleton of not white bones…but black before dispersing into dust that also dissolves to nothing….

                And then….an impending darkness that swallows up everything…


	4. Chapter 3: Safe

**Chapter 3**

               

                                _Linka’s POV_

               

                She’s too young.

                This wasn’t supposed to happen.

                My only daughter, lays limp on these flat mats, as if she’s already passed to the heavens. Pale, so close to death, I am sure I will have to fight the grim reaper tonight. A mother should never have to see her child like this. My poor baby, how her skin is riddled with bruises and cuts, bones broken and repaired.

                Why, oh why did I let her go through this?

                I hear his footsteps down the hall, in a way, they are like a ghosts, so quiet and soft. Nothing can pass a mother’s ears; I can hear him approaching the room with a speed I am sure he wasn’t expecting even to himself. His heart is beating fast, he’s nervous, and yet I never see any emotions on that boy’s sleeve – only anger and apathy.

                Behind me, the door slides open with little to no noise, with how quick his heart is beating I half anticipated the door to slam but instead, it opens slowly. I refuse to lift my eyes from my child, even after he closes the door and comes to my side. I only turn his way when I see him through my peripherals, as he kneels down to sit.

                His amber eyes cold, but I can spot the slightest of tenderness behind the entire act. And even when my eyes take him in full, acknowledging his presence, he doesn’t look away from her.

                My eyes follow suit, and I stare back down at my little girl whose breathing is so barely there that my heart breaks each time she intakes. It is killing me inside, the silence and the uncertainty.

 Will she survive the night? Will her powers heal her? What good was all the fighting and running if I lose the very thing I want to protect most?    

I let it sink it, all the questions my mind dances with, and before I know it I start talking…spilling out anything as long as it fills the quiet. “Our powers,” I clear my throat, I can feel the choke of dread. “We are not meant to handle our powers or gain them until we reach maturity.”

“Yet she was able too.”

“To protect you.” There can’t be any other way. That must be why her powers awakened so young – even with her father’s blood, her body would or could have been destroyed just from accidently using a gust of wind from her powers – but she used one of her most powerful.

Lightning. The most powerful of nature’s elements.

“My father says you are powerful, probably the most powerful creature he’s met, so how come you’re too weak to heal her?”

The words are ice, but I must accept the reality. “Because, she’s more powerful. My daughter will become an essence of power no one will have the likes to imagine; all because I was born out of generations of full blooded elves, each collecting the powers of the previous.

She will gain our ancestors’ powers and my own; let’s not also include her father’s. A full blooded demon whose powers had humans believing he is a god. It’s the mix of his blood in her veins that truly prevents me from saving her…”

“If she was able to use her powers to protect me, why didn’t she kill those guards in the woods?” There is a hiss behind his words, I can just vaguely hear it but it is there. Is he angry at her for not protecting herself? Or at the guards for doing the damage they had?

I tilt my head towards him and smile softly, “child, we’ve been through war – on the run for some time now – we’ve witness the deaths of those we cared deeply about. She probably didn’t find herself worth fighting for, on the other hand, she had no idea of what her powers could do or when they’d come out or how…Neither did I.”

Both our eyes revert back to her, my little mysterious girl. So powerful, but so tiny.

After a few minutes, he stands up beside me and I watch him curiously as he heads for the door. “Tell me when she wakes.”

I don’t get to respond before he’s closing the door behind him.

 

\---*

                _Lahona’s POV_

__

_…Clap…Boom…_

My body springs up like I’ve been electrified. The room fades back into darkness just as quickly as a yellow flare light it up. My eyes are wide and full of the terror I suffer. The wooden mats below me quivers to the assault on the land, and I start to shiver along with it.

To my left my mother sleeps undisturbed and to my right the sliding door has been left half open. The view beyond its openness provides me the sight I fear most. Wind blows pellets of rain the size of pebbles onto the porch, darkening the tan color to a light brown and causing large puddles to seep towards the door. The ominous clouds above darken the world outside to the point I can’t see beyond the porch until lightning sparks in the distance.

It reveals a mysteriously dangerous scene: tree limbs juggle and fight eachother, leaves burst off their homes and collide into the nearest objects, being torn apart like forgotten puzzle pieces, flowers drown and suffocate in the murky mud. After the lightning marks the land, the ground shakes with another loud rumble of thunder.

 A panicky scream parts my lips, I cover my head instinctively.

I see them….I see the lifeless bodies stabbed and thrown in the mud as the rain beats on their decaying bodies. Fire reaches them in seconds, destroying all traces of their once glorious existence. Their screams of pain and agony, of terror and desperation echoes but is always beaten by the octave of the thunder. Lightning can’t light the way, only adds a dreary fright in the background as fire surrounds us all. It’s the war. It is surrounding me again.

I cover my ears to keep from hearing them, but I can still feel the heat as if it is really here next to me.

Another clap of lightning  - the palace shakes and creaks. How can my mother sleep through this?

I tear my hands from my ears and clench my eyes; I know if I open them I will see the faces of all the dead. All those people who died and my mother and I were the only ones to escape. I don’t want to feel that guilt. I must escape.

I’m on my knees in seconds, prying the door to the hall way open with trembling fingers. The door slides a quarter open and I fight it no longer. I squirm through its crack and crawl my way down the hall.

It takes all my inner strength just to ignore the pain that pours through me. All I focus on is getting away, I can practically feel their ghostly hands reaching for my toes as I shuffle down to the last door. I stab my fingers into the door and tear this one open unlike the other.

“You are awake…” His voice isn’t as empty as normal…and it’s enough to have me open my eyes.

His room is dark but not as dark as the woods beyond the porch. Within this dimness I can see his eyes, amber orbs stare at me from a sitting position, but it’s all I can see of him. They are soft and round, almost as if he has some sort of emotion in him other than hate.

When I look into them I feel saf-

_…Boom…_

The panels and screens shutter, my body collapses to the floor, my hands clutch over my head for protection. I’m trembling again….I can just barely hear their screams…

I won’t let them get me….

I rush to my knees and crawls to his bed mat, his eyes watch me suspiciously as I invade the space to his right. My body curls into a ball against him, his body heat like lava against the chill of my broken flesh, it’s beyond comforting.

Seconds pass, and only silence follows. He doesn’t ask why I came, or if I am okay. All he does is lower himself down beside me and when I look up to see if he’s angry at my intrusion, I spot his eyes narrowly glaring up at the ceiling.

He’s back to his normal, uncaring domineer but at least he’s not yelling. I know though….he must be thinking how weak I am, how pathetic of a wife I will be. That I am not worthy of any treasury.

“I’m sorry I am weak,” this earns his attention, his head tilts to me and I can just barely see a brow rising, “I don’t want to be weak. I will become strong enough to be a worthy wife for you….”

“Stupid girl.” He replies. His hand lifts the blanket; expecting to be hit I flinch away from the movement, but instead of an impact of pain, his hand gently pats the top of my head. “I will kill all who harm you. I will protect you.”

There it goes again, my belly fills up with the light fluttering of butterflies and my cheeks warm. His arm eyes still stare up at the ceiling but are less narrowed again. I believe what he says….It might be the last time I ever hear anything nice from him…And I smile.

Thunder shakes the ground again….But I am unafraid.

I am safe.


	5. Chapter 4: Run

**Chapter 4**

               

                “You won’t believe what I saw,” he’s trying to whisper but the excitement fills his voice with a level of volume that prevents him from doing so. It doesn’t help that the throne room is empty enough to cause an echo to the sound of a pin dropping either.

                Even so, his excitement un-phases Lady Kimi, who sits on the single large purple pillow in front of him. She looks elegantly prestigious sitting there, her body straight and royal-like but her eyes fill with the upmost boredom.  Before Lord Inutaisho had even arrived this morning she’d looked like this – at least from what I could tell at the breakfast table.

After breakfast I was too weak to play outside so instead I decided to see if I could follow our almighty Lord around the Palace without being seen. I’ve done good so far with only a peek or two by the guards – at which I quickly rushed into the shadows to get out of view. In the end I had lost him for a few minutes before I spotted him again heading for the throne room.

The room is so large and empty of furniture that even if I could get in without being spotted by him I would surely be spotted afterwards; so I crawled into a tiny crawl space within a closet in the hall and poked a hole through the screen to watch and hear them.

                “I don’t care, Taisho.” Distaste rolls off her in waves with the single sentence. It has me shuddering.

                “You don’t understand!” He raises her voice; his temperament quickly diminishes into sudden irritation. “She has the power of resurrection! To my knowledge all she could do was heal, but she can bring the dead back to life!”

                My mother.

                I was six when I first saw it myself. I was sleeping in bed when I was woken by a bang at my window; rolling out of bed and looking down from my two story high window I saw my mother holding a little white bird whose feathers were covered in blood. Seeing the little bird, I had come to realize the blood on the clear glass just above me and my heart broke for the little creature. I shouldn’t have kept the window closed that night.

                And while I was panicking my little heart away, down below I saw my mother shine a brilliant white. She whispered something I couldn’t hear and closed her eyes….Seconds felt like minutes as she stood there holding the bird in the glowing light and then suddenly!

                The bird perched up on her palm, looked at her and then flew off in the opposite direction of my window. My mother was smiling but she looked different – weak almost – as if all her energy and a part of her life was drained as well. She spotted me watching her and later that day explained to me what happened.

                _“Yes, I can bring animals back from the dead, but with it I can lose my soul in the process.”_ She had said. _“You see, demons rule the other side, good and bad ones, ones that lead to the light and ones that devour souls. If they see me, a living being, they would either possess me or devour my soul.”_

I had asked her if she’d ever done it on another person, she said she had tried but she failed. She too was about to be taken. Demons crave people’s souls more than animals – ours are more corrupted with sin and hate, while animals are instinctual and innocent.

                Kimi rolls her eyes at this new knowledge as if it’s nothing more than old news.

                In shock, Inutaisho throws his hands to his sides and his mouth gapes open when he talks, “Do you know what this means? The possibilities of power is endless! Just imagine how powerful Lahona will be!”

                “I don’t care!” She snaps. Her voice echoes throughout the room and down the halls. Retorting from the little hole I was peeking through, I hold my ears until the ringing stops and when I do I feel my ears perk below my palms. A shuffling can be heard at my side, I glance over my shoulder, heart racing thinking it’s a guard but instead, I smile at the sight of Sesshomaru.

                Without a problem he crawls through the crevice I found and doesn’t even questions me when he looks up. He raises a brow at the makeshift hole I made and next to it makes him own. My smile widens and we both lean in to watch further.

                “Kimi…” Inutaisho sighs. He shakes his head in defeat. Kimi’s expression is back to normal except for her lips that curl just the slightest over her fangs and a glint of red in her amber eyes. “Lahona will not hurt Sesshomaru. She’s protected him and he for her. Why can’t you-”

                “No one will be good enough for my son.” She hisses.

                The words drop my heart and it shatters like porcelain and with my sadness, my ears drop low and I frown. There is no possible way I could hurt Sesshomaru, he is far stronger than I, but she is right. I will never be good enough for him either.

                A nudge hits my bruised ribs, I cringe in pain and glance to my side to see Sesshomaru. His amber eyes practically glow in the dark; they narrow when mine meets his.

                “Where are you going?”

                We both swiftly go back to our holes, on the other side of the wall, Inutaisho’s back is to his wife and his face is mixed with anger and sadness.  His head shakes and he lets out another sigh. “I’m going to find a way to harness life and death. If Linka and Lahona can do it, then we demons must be able to as well. And if I succeed, one day Sesshomaru will have a piece of the ability his wife will have.”

                She cringes at the words, like they are poison she has to eat, like I am some kind of ugly beast. Inutaisho doesn’t stick around to hear her frustration any longer; he leaves in haste, slamming the sliding door behind him.

                I can still feel it; my heart in my stomach, throbbing painful and causing me to whirl in pain. Pulling from the hole I fall back onto my butt, the last few days rolling around in my head like an angry storm. We’ve gotten accustomed to one another, fighting evil guards like boogey men, but she is right.

                I look up at Sesshomaru, his apathetic face watches me with a calm handsomeness now that I’ve grown used to it. He will grow up continuing to be handsome and only gaining strength physically and in power but will I?

                Rolling off my butt, I crawl through the crevice and make my way across the hall to a sliding door, opening it I step onto the porch where the sun’s rays warm my broken skin. Looking over myself, I am quickly reminded of the truth.

                There is no denying it, I am both my mother’s and my father’s child – I will become strong. So strong that I will bring despair and agony to this world; humans and demons both will sense my power, they will fear or crave it. They will want to steal everything from me and demolish all I know until they either end me or find a way to tear it from my being.

                And anyone….anyone who gets close will be in danger.

                Just like them – my people – who stood at my mother’s and my side when our homes were burned down. My people…who are all dead.

                The world blurs around me until mixed colors of green, white, yellows, reds and oranges and as it does, tears swell up in my eyes. Suddenly, I feel cold…and I shudder.

                My feet pushes me off the porch with such intense speed I almost trip when I touch the ground below but I don’t stop, I come to a crawl before standing back up and bursting with all my strength into the forest

                I can hear him behind me, following, but with him I can hear them; the screams of all the victims who fell to death. They fell not for my mother…but because of me. I am the reason. The reason my mother and I are the last.

                My legs ache painfully but I won’t stop.

                I want to run, run and hide from all my problems and all my faults.

                Run until the sun explodes, till the ocean is empty and the mountains are flat!

                Run until I feel nothing left and the world is no longer full of anger and fear.

                Until I can find a place where I can no longer hurt anyone…ever again.

                Until…..

 

                There is no ground below me…I look down but my vision is so blurred from tears and the speed I am running that I can’t tell why I don’t feel the forest floor anymore. How long have I been running that I can’t feel? A buckling cracks through me and out from under me my legs give up.

                Head first I collide into the ground, soft sand disperses everywhere as I roll twice before landing flat on my back. A throbbing takes over my entire body but I simply…can’t feel. My vision returns slowly to where I am met with clear blue skies and the sound of the ocean…

                I take a long, deep breath through my nose…Salty air fills my lungs, sand covers my body. I must have ran straight through the forest and to where my mother and I were at the beach.

                It doesn’t feel the same…That day during our great escape.

                The sky is cloudless and bird less, a sight of just blue, until Sesshomaru’s head appears above me and completely blocks my view.

                We stare at one another. Me with tears still running down the side of my face because I can’t seem to stop them and him with such apathy that ice couldn’t compare to the chill of it.  We stare for a long minute, breathing in the salty air and letting out all the bad that just took over me.

                “Want me to kill her?” He asks.

                I choke on air at his sudden question, coughing up a fit until I roll on my side to stop it. He has to be joking, that’s his mother for crying out loud. But I look back up at him just to check. I’ve never seen his eyes so serious before, like he aged hundred of years.

                Somehow….

                Bursting out into laughter I wipe away my tears and sit on my butt once again. The laughter keeps coming, I can’t stop. I don’t know why it’s funny but I laugh until a different set of tears start to fall.

                “Sh- She’s your m-mom.”

                “So?” He asks. The seriousness still there.

                I shake my head and pat the sand beside me, “Sit, please.”

                To my surprise he actually does.

                He comes to my side and sits only an inch from me, when he does I feel an sensational warmth go through me that washes away all the pain and hurt I felt moments ago. Smiling, I wipe away the last bit of tears that stain my cheeks and we both stare out towards the ocean.

                The sound of the waves rolling up on the beach, the soothing calm of the breeze and the heat of the sun is far better than being cooped up inside all day. I can stay here all day…forever even.

                “Your dad…” I start, earning a raised brow from Sesshomaru but not quite a turn of the head. “He is right by the way. I will be getting my mom’s abilities…and my father’s. It is because of these powers that humans came to my village.

                We don’t know how they found out about me and my mixed blood but when they came, they came with weapons and fire. They screamed that we are not ‘true gods.’ Whatever that meant…But they witch hunted us out of our homes while we slept. They killed our patrol men and encircled the entire village except for one exit with fire. The exit they left open would lead us to their swords.

                With the smoke so thick…most of my people didn’t see them there until it was too late. I can still here their screaming…Men, women and children, in their beds, out of their houses, all being killed just because we had abilities they were scared of. That only my mother and I had.

                I don’t know how she did it but my mother was able to get us through the flames and away from the battle, and under the guise of smoke she got us far from it all. We could still hear the screams miles away….and I can still hear them every time it storms.

                It rained that night, but the rain couldn’t stop the flames from destroying everything. Our kingdom was the last of its kind, a sanctuary for all elven and faerie folk and just in a single night it was taken.”

                I look down at my legs, feet and toes. The bruises that cover me oddly remind me of their ashes that caked me that night. The dead blanketed my skin and I wasn’t even the least bit traumatized by it – just their screams. The ash blanket kind of felt like I was protected and in some way, I felt like I was taking some of them with me so they wouldn’t suffer anymore.

                “Who do you think told the humans?”

                “My mom thinks it was my father. She’s told me a few times that he was referred to as the Devil.”

                “Devil?”

                I never understood what she meant either; but maybe it was a human term…

                “It’s not your fault.” He’s watching me now; I can see him from my peripherals. I try to smile for his comment but it is hard to believe anything after that. “Your powers can save or kill. Humans are weak and scared; they run away or kill what they don’t understand. They were bound to go after your people eventually – with or without you.”

                As painful as it is to hear that, I know he is right. I just can’t help but blame myself for it all, for existing.

                We both stare back out to the sea and we stay in this silence…until the sun goes down and the world around us turns to darkness….

                Finally…I can feel free.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6: Expect me to win

 

                This isn’t fog; the night air is choked by a much thicker atmosphere, one that clogs all senses with the remains of those caught by the flames. The taste of the dead clings to my tongue as ash snows down from the sky. No matter how fast I run, I know it will be too late, the screams stopped minutes ago, and all that is left is the echoes of the spirits.

                I was tricked. I see that now, blinded by the men I called my soldiers who were highly skilled lizard demons under the guise of humans. Their abilities, that even I, Inutaisho, Lord of the West and God among demons, couldn’t even smell their swampy stench pass the camouflage. Only one creature would go to the depths that one has to get at me and my family: Ryukotsusei. How ignorant was I to leave my family and those I swore to protect in the hands of others. Kimi, my strong willed wife, can easily protect herself and our child but her blood is much darker and filled with spiteful sin than even I. She will not fight for those she doesn’t care for even if it gave her, her ultimate desires.

                Ahead, I spot the flickers of dying flames beyond the wall of smoke and ash. No longer do I hear the sound of Kimi’s battle cries; the enemies must all be eliminated for I know she is alive, and I know my son, is as well, for a mother’s scream for a child would cause mountains to crumble and the Earth has yet to quake.

                A brilliant golden flicker escapes from the wall of smoke in a puff, leaving a tray of tiny golden stars behind it. I skid o a stop, my arm clinking as metal scrapes against metal. This golden flicker isn’t a flame; it has a silhouette abnormal to a speck of fire. It can’t be any bigger than a beetle. It flutters closer and closer, and as it approaches towards me I realize the size it is, is apparent. It is a butterfly. One that glows with a luminous aura so strong that as it closes to me, I can feel a heat touch my cheeks. The little insect hovers before my face, radiantly beautiful, but even with its glorious glow, all I feel is the heaviness of grief.

                “What are you?”

                For a second, I am sure it understands me. I don’t know how I know, but I’m sure. It flaps its tiny wings and flutters off to my left passing through the smoke as quickly as it came, the trail of tiny golden stars are left behind. My eyes glance back towards the fallen palace in the distance….Where my family is….where home used to be, and then back towards the disappearing trail.

                I rush in quick pursuit of that butterfly.

                I’m led to the cliffs where the ocean meets land with a devastating force only nature can create. On the dirt path along the cliffs, are deep grooves made by some kind of wheel and centering them are hoof prints. Whoever this was, was in a hurry….The butterfly takes a turn around a curve in the cliffs shadowed by trees, beyond the curve I see my son. Sesshomaru stands toes to the edge of the cliff, overlooking the rageful waves below. Behind him is a massive mound of Earth, unlike anything I have seen before, that is in the shape of a large wave angled for the cliffs edge. It is there that the wheel tracks have ended.

                Something’s not right…

                I start for him but the moment I place down a foot, the butterfly turns back towards me. The glow around its small form brightens and enlarges until the form of Lady Linka is distinguished through lamination. This looks like her, but at the same time…Her skin is gold, like the butterfly and an aura embrace her. The once liveliness in her eyes are full of sadness and grief.

                It befalls me, the little girl I swore to protect along with her mother, must be dead…I failed….”No…” The word leaves my lips without control. I choke on my breath, my heart squeezes in my chest. She was only a little girl, “No…” Linka twists towards Sesshomaru, her eyes never leaving me, and as she does I notice that he watches me; his eyes like anything I’ve seen before. There is so much anger in him, so much more than I felt in myself and seen in his mother. Anger, a raging flame that I know from the bottom of my heart will change him for the rest of his life.

                “She’s gone.” It is all he needs to say. His voice is not my son’s anymore. It is grown, like a man. “She fought.” His hand waves to the massive mound of Earth, it is a giant compared to him, “she fought for than you did.” He hisses. “I fought. Where were you when you promised them?”

                I glance at Linka; she still watches me, unmoving like a beautiful celestial goddess of death. There is no anger beyond her eyes, just despair. A mother who lost a child, comes back to the man who failed to protect them both – a curse I am sure I’ll live with every day as I wake from sleep.

                “I promised her,” he regains my attention, “I promised to protect her. Promised to become the strongest for her.”

                My heart sinks much further than the ocean next to us. This is what I had agreed to, the betrothal was for him to learn how to care, to get out of his mother’s mentality of apathy to humans and others, and the moment he did – he lost her. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

                “I’m…”

                “Don’t. I don’t want to hear it.” He waves a hand at me, and heads up the dirt road, keeping a good distance from me as he passes by, “expect me to challenge you, father. And expect me to win.”

 

 

                The world was on fire – that was the last I remember. Smoke had filled my lungs, fog covered my eyes, and I was dying. Dying in an ocean of cold, bleak water with only the cloudy sky and moon hovering over me. How come I can still think? Why am I here, stuck between the world of dreams and reality? How do I know I am here to begin with?

                There is popping in my ears, it first started off very faint and far away but it’s coming closer now. It is very familiar, too familiar. Scary familiar. The closer it gets the easier it is for me to smell the ever suffocating smoke. Am I back in the fire? The one that took my mother? Through the dark I can see her grey, lifeless eyes staring at me, mouth slightly open with no breath leaving. The sound of her skin boiling and the smell of flesh as it burns. The image shakes me, so fervently that the darkness disperses the image completely and replaces it with a brightening light.

                The sound of popping is right at my ears now, so I open my eyes and my head falls to my side like a limp stick. There next to me is a firepit, and it is cooking a pot of food. I can’t smell what the food is, my nose is numb and my sense of smell is numb along with it. Breathing in hurts every organ inside me, my throat burns from the salt water and my mouth is dry. I am so thirsty but I hurt too much to even swallow.

                I roll my head back and forth, slowly so the throbbing doesn’t paralyze me.  From what I can see, I am not in the palace or in the ocean anymore. The ceiling and four walls are made of reeds and bamboo. There are two squares that I would call glassless windows. There isn’t any furniture in this single room hut except for, what I think is a pillow under my head. My sense of touch is as numb as my sense of smell, so I can’t tell what the ground below is made of but given what I can see is dirt.

                Whoever lives here is either poor or never cared for materialistic goods, unlike my lifestyle before I met Sesshomaru and even as I was at the palace.

                How am I even alive right now? Outside the windows, the sky is blue and cloudless. I can just barely hear the chattering of people but I can’t be a hundred percent sure that my hearing isn’t going in and out. My body throbs, each time a wave rolls along through me, pinpoints all along my body sting, ache, burn or what I think, bleeds. I must be covered in wounds. I must not look myself.

                How did anyone find me? The last I recall I was floating away from shore. I knew I was dying but I wasn’t scared. I don’t think I can feel fear anymore….

                Between the two windows, there is a door with a reed flap. Sunlight streams through the tiny slits and then evades my sight when someone enters the hut. For a split second I am blinded by the sun but as the person enters, I am covered by a shadow. There standing tall with a gentle smile is a woman with long black wavy hair, big brown eyes and a four digit star on her forehead.  She wears a very unique outfit, but I am not used to this land and the fashion. The baggy red pants look heavy, the white long sleeved shirt, is larger than she is, and she wears socks with thin topless shoes. She can’t be any older than fifteen, but her eyes seem beyond their years.

                “We were close in losing you,” her voice is much like her eyes, sweet but mature, “what’s your name?

                When I open my mouth to respond, the corners of my lips crack and split. They are so dry they feel like paper, tears well up in my eyes without my control. Her smile vanishes and she hurries to my side, waving at me in a gesturing I am assuming means, ‘stop.’

                “Don’t worry.” She says softly, “All can be explained later. I found you on the shore, all scraped up and bleeding ‘bout everywhere.” She kneels down at my side and places a hand on my forehead. I can’t feel her touch, only the pain of my lips. “You are unlike any demon I’ve seen before. Normally I can sense the power and weaknesses of about anyone, particularly demons but all I can feel come from you is great power but the rest is mystery.” People from this land have no idea what I am; it’s full of demons and humans from what I can tell but nothing as of such of my species. “Regardless, you can stay here as long as you need. I know it will be a bit, you are pretty beaten up. Now rest, I am going to get you some water.”

                She stands, brushing off her baggy red pants. She turns and heads for the reed flap to leave. My eyes watch her but my mind screams. I want her to know what I am, I want her to know that I am thankful but most of all – I want her to know I will leave…and I will get my vengeance.

                I forcefully swallow, it hurts and chokes me, I cough so hard my entire body trembles. Still, I push through it. “Elf.” I fight out. She looks over her shoulder at me with wide, surprised eyes. The very word sends chills through me. I am the last of my kind. I am all alone. Without my mother, without Sesshomaru and without a home. Will they come look for me? Do they think I am dead?

                Those demons…They killed her and stripped me of everything. Anger fills every vein, I feel energetic but immobile. “I….I want vengeance.”

                A smile grows at the right corner of her lips, she touches the door frame and the reed creeps open letting in some of the light. “I can train you, I specialize in killing demons and I am assuming with the type of wounds you have…that, that is what caused your outcome.” She steps a little bit out before continuing, “By the way, my name is Midoriko.”

 

 

 


	7. Chapter 5: Half Demon

Chapter 5

 

                The sun has been done for an hour now, but I can still feel the heat of its embrace; warm, comforting, and safe. That’s how I’d like to imagine I feel but I believe that I’ve lost all memory of how those feel.  Salty wind brushes my cheeks, dashing my hair back and forth across my back and causing the ocean to roar with small waves that beat the sand. Sincere.

                But I can’t smell the salt. Matter in fact; I can’t smell anything but a distinct, thick scent that is all too familiar. The aroma hot, burning my nose hairs and recoiling me far from the peace I was once feeling moments ago. Sesshomaru and I both take a deep whiff to pinpoint the smell. The more I suck in, the one it burns; even reaching my lungs.

                “Fire.” He states.

                An earsplitting scream echoes from the forest; it is a woman’s, and I know it better than anything in the world. That’s when I hear it, that voice that whispered threats in my head after my meeting with the guards in the forest. ‘She’s next.’

                Fear and adrenaline pumps through my veins so quickly that I’m up on my feet in seconds, “Mom!” There is no thinking – there is just running. Much like I did earlier that day. I burst into the forest where I can now see the cloud of smoke rise out from; ignoring all instinct that tells me to run. “Mom!” I repeat.

                The smoke is thick as it clogs the forest, dancing like a sick game around the trunks of the once beautiful trees. The closer I get the harder it is for me to see and breathe, both my eyes and lungs scream in agony as my eyes water in attempt to ward off the beast that dares to blind me. No matter how close I get, I feel so far away from her, so far away from the palace.

                The smoke to my left breaks revealing Sesshomaru at my side, and as soon as he appears is the second I realize I am no longer running anymore. He’s managed to get me so quick on his back that my brain couldn’t register it through all the fear and panic. He’s speed is so incredibly fast that the smoke doesn’t have time to sink into my lungs to burn me  but my eyes are still being beaten.

                The closer we get, the louder the crackling of wood can be heard with the sounds of men hollering and swords clattering; an earthshaking roar rips through the forest, the sound alone disperses the smoke for a mere second before it returns to hazing the area.

                Up ahead a brilliant yellow light dances over what remains of the palace, it grows larger and larger, the nearer we become and within an instant I’m sweating head to toe. The entire palace is consumed by the hungry flames, leaving only charred wood that sticks up like dead hands that reach for the starry sky. My heart drops at the sight; it is exactly how I remember it, like the village.

                Nothing was left behind, not even bodies were.

                Sesshomaru stops where the field of flowers meets the forest, the red, yellows and oranges that used to be are now wilted and frowning to the ground if they had not been flattened by the haste of guards rushing in all directions. Ash rains down on us like grey snow, marking our cheeks, hair, and clothes. The ash of the dead.

                To the right of us, an enormous white dog with red eyes and purple markings on its cheeks battles with the guards that once protected us. The beast roars, shaking the ground once again, dispersing the environment of smoke only for it to return thicker. The beast kicks and jolts back and forth within the ruins, throwing whatever guards had managed to climb on in swift movements. IT sinks its teeth into their armor without a problem and tears them apart with its long claws.

                The guards keep coming, on and on. When do they stop?

                “Mother.” Sesshomaru mutters under me. It is this word that reminds me of my panic.

                Sliding off his back I rush for the flames in the direction where my room used to be. The flames hiss at me, reaching its hands for my hair when I near but I ignore it. I find a way inside under a collapse pillar that is burnt black, and crawl into my room. The once empty space that only had our thin mattresses is now a collapsed room full of burnt beams and flaming screens. The door across from me is barricaded with wooden planks so black it is hard to tell even what they are.

                The flames choke out any air that once was in this room, leaving me heaving in seconds. Everything burns, my lungs, my heart, my stomach, it burns so much I fall to my knees. Next to me, at my left I spot a stream of glistening red, and immediately I know what that is. My stomach drops, just as the ash and sparks of embers around me, all I can do is focus on that stream of blood; hearing the words ‘She’s next, she’s next’.

                Please no, please great spirits don’t let it be her!

                Bending forward, I hesitantly peer under the plants and beams and when I do, a blood curdling scream leaves me; a painful sob rolls over me so quick I tremble.

                There, beneath all that decay, eyes hazed over with a film of grey, stares back at me: my mother. Her right hand reaches out towards me, as if even in death, she’s trying to grab for me. There from her belly shines a sword that I recognize as the one the guards use. Her pretty white kimono is no longer white but a dark red.

                Over-cumbered by the pain, broken my grief, I slip slowly onto my belly and reach for her hand that is so close but so far. Her image blurs the more the tears gather in my eyes, reshaping her. She was all I had left….

                I’m all alone…

                “Mommy…” I whisper, the tears fall, not wasting time crawling down my cheeks but instead washing the floor with their saltiness.

                The fire reaches down for her, catching onto her kimono first and quickly setting her to flames. It chars her beautiful hair black before curling it in a mess of tumble weeds until it reaches her scalp. Her pale pink flesh turns an apple red, blisters, boils and pops. Blood sprays hot like acid, tiny droplets reach the top of my hand.

                It burns hot, but all I can really feel is my heart breaking over and over again, sobs continuous roll through me, helping the smoke to choke me slowly. I won’t leave her…I will join her. Her death was quick and mine will be slow…but she won’t be alone.

                “Mommy…” it hurts to say it, my throat hurts so much.

                They were right, she was next. They waited for their chance; when Inutaisho left…

                “There she is!” I hear, but I am so close to being gone that all I can do is smile. You will not have me….You may have my body…but never my soul. Closing my eyes, I can start feeling the fire touch the hairs on my arms. My throat hurts so much it thickens until I can’t push anymore air out of me….

                Suddenly, there is a draft of wind; my body no longer feels like it is lying. I’m flown up, a pair of hands at my waist before I feel the impact of metal under my stomach. A weak groan leaves my lips, a hole in my throat opens and I can breathe again. Wood cracks all around, I open my eyes in time to see the wood beams collapse on her body. Tears become rivers that wash the ash from my cheeks. I try to reach for her from the shoulder I’m now stuck on but my arms are too weak. “Mo….”

                “Let’s get her to the carriage before that damned kid sees us.”

                The person I am on is a soldier. He wears the same armor as all the others and sounds the same as them too. He turns and heads out the entrance I came in from but instead of crawling, kicks the wood out of the way in one move. Behind him I see a second guard.

                I don’t bother fighting. I don’t have the strength or will too anyway.

                As he passes us through the exit, fire chars my hair but quickly goes out when we reach outside. Fresh air gets caught in my breath, my body quakes to violent coughs. My lungs ache; they feel like I have nails in them. The guards ignore my raking pain and continue onward to the front of the palace. Through blurry vision I watch the guard that’s behind us, he pays no mind to me but behind him I see a figure that is a mass of white.

                Sesshomaru…

                Like I had with my mother, I reach for him and this time, my arm lifts to do so. With the further I reach the more my vision returns. On his face, an expression I’ve never seen before on anyone, an expression of complete hot, deadly rage.

                I’m not alone…I’m not alone!

                “Sesshomaru!” I cry out: Not alone. Not alone!

                The two guards pause to look behind them, “Fuck that kid again. I got him, get her out of here.” The one behind us says. He rushes for Sesshomaru with fierce velocity.

                The guard who holds me, doesn’t stop to look back no longer, he bolts for the front and takes us around the corner of the burning palace. He only stops once, when he does I’m thrown into the back of a carriage of some sort, landing on my butt and tumbling to my side. At both sides of the carriage sits two guards. Leaning up I look to the back of the carriage to see the guard who was carrying me turn back towards the palace.

                Hands come from both sides of me, grabbing my arms and legs to withhold me from escaping but I fight: kicking, scratching, pushing, shrugging, punching and pulling but not much strength is in me. I am weak from grief and ache from smoke. I manage to fight my way to my knees, pushing my head forward towards the back of the carriage but I am stuck at this point.

                “Let me go!” I shout, “Sesshomaru!”

                A loud, earth rumbling replies. Out from around the corner, my betrothed comes charging, now only one guard stands in his way now.

                I can’t help but smile, and with my grief, tears of happiness start to shed.

                The carriage skips back and forth below us, my glance back to the front and notice we’re taking off and quick. The horses sprint forward and we all go tumbling towards the back of the carriage. The guards moan and groan but I’m too emotionally worn to feel the physical and immediately get to my knees to crawl to the exit.

                A hand clutches my left ankle, dragging me back once more. No!

                Without my control, my eyes focuses on the guard between the carriage and Sesshomaru; a growl comes up from me and I reach for that damned guard and as I do so the ground quakes and rumbles like thunder. Cracks in the earth shatter the land as massive cone – like spears plunge from the Earth’s surface, racing towards the guard.

                He looks back to me, but too late, an earth spear impales him from below. The heat of anger washes from me and all I feel is in awe. My hand shakes in tremors, I bring it back to me and when I do, the spears return to the earth, causing the impaled guard to slam back to earth with such force even from my distance I can hear his bones crack.

                A smile stretches my lips again; fogginess develops around me and everything goes black.

 

\----*

 

                The sound of hoarse muttering wakes me. There are many voices, maybe three or four – enough for me to keep my eyes closed just in case. Every inch of me aches, my legs are sore, my lungs burn, my heart is heavy and my head throbs. The last thing I remember was that attack: Earth spears’ erupting from the ground and impaling that one guard but after, it was all black. With the world coming to my senses, I know I am better of just pretending I am still unconscious. Who knows what they will do to me if they know I am awake.

                “He’ll be pleased. Don’t worry, she’s what he wanted.” Male voices; obviously the guards that are towing with me on this bumpy carriage, but now that I am listening to them I notice something odd. They aren’t that familiar; they found very nasally and croak with almost every word like a frog. “I just think the mother would have been more valuable. She had control over her powers plus she brought creatures back to life. I saw it myself!”

                “Ryukotsusei strictly said the girl. She’s young enough to break and rebuild into a killing machine.” Another says.

                Mother…I can still see her skin boiling in my mind and smell her frying hair. A thickness grows in my throat; I try to control and regulate my breathing like my mother taught me when we were hiding once.

                These were the men that killed her. They stole her from me. And unfortunately for them, I don’t feel anymore fear, only anger and there is nothing more than I want, than to see their faces full of terror.

                Opening my eyes to slits, I focus solely on my rage, biting down harshly onto my bottom lip to control the energy that builds in me. The carriage beneath me bounces and shakes, creaks and pops over every little rock that happens under it. My eyes search for the soldiers that stole everything from me but when I lay eyes on them my heart sinks.

                I knew it.

                The men here are still wearing the same armor with the exception of the helms that hid their faces, but now that they are free - the few days I stayed at the palace makes perfect sense. Open their heads is no human flesh, but that of a lizard.

                Ugly, pointed nose, large eyes and pointed teeth. Scaly skin stretches along their bodies in a variety of colors; their eyes the shape of gigantic almonds with strikingly yellow orbs. They have holes for ears and snouts that could probably sniff people out for miles; beneath their nose are long mouths with sharp yellowish fangs.

                Lizard demons.

                Once upon a time, I had heard about them and their incredible shape shifting ability. I was told they only used it to blend into their surroundings to escape much stronger predators but obviously, my knowledge didn’t touch base in the east. But this explains why…why I couldn’t hear them approaching. How they were faster than me. But why attack us? We only arrived a few days prior. And who is this Ryukotsusei guy?

                The carriage bounces much higher than normal, throwing me inches from the floor and smashing  me back down hard enough for me to wince in agony. My throat clenches and my lungs burn once again, I almost forgot about my other pains. My eyes shoot wide open and now I am staring up at the ceiling of the carriage that holds me hostage.

                “Well looks who’s up.”

                My eyes dart to each individual lizard man, and each are darting their large eyes at me. No sense in pretending now. Sitting up, I lean back against the nearest wall, which happens to be on my left, never once pulling my eyes from them. They are all smirking, yellow nasty teeth showing and all. It only makes me angrier.

                That entire time they were plotting against us. How could they sneak up on her?

                My fists curls at my sides, every part of me feels hot and boiling.

                “What? What are you going to do?” One coos at me.

                “Don’t,” says another to the one who pesters me. “You saw what she did.”

                “Don’t worry,” I snarl, I didn’t mean to make it come out that way but I am glad it did. Their eyes flicker for a moment, a tiny bit of fear? “When I kill you, it won’t be as weak as stabbing you in the back.”

                They all throw their heads back in laughter. My fists curl so tight I can feel my nails bury deep into my palms, a rumbling growl comes out as a little kids grunt. The cart starts to shake more, this time side to side. My heart races in my ears, thump, thump, thump. The clear vision blurs faintly with the film of red. Images of her body boiling replays on and on in my head, each time I blink, her grey eyes are staring back at me.

                “What would you know? You’re just a child. A poor, little orphan elf child. With nothing.”

                Tearing my eyes off them is like pouring hot metal on cold metal; I hear the sizzle in my head. I concentrate on the open back of the carriage, noticing now that the bounces we’re getting is due to a very thin dirt road that runs along a cliff’s edge. I can see the ocean across from me, it is still night but in the sky darker clouds are rolling in, the waves down below respond with rage, hitting the cliff with such force as to shape the rock to its will.

                “No.” I reply. Their laughter stops but I don’t bother looking at them any longer. I have enough power in me now…I have enough strength and I don’t care if I go down with them. “I may be an orphan but not some little elf orphan.” The words come out as a hiss, I feel what I say like beating drums in my blood. “I am also half demon. Half of such an evil demon that he slaughtered the place he called home in hopes to kill my mother and me.”

                Just as untamed as the sea, my eyes glance to the men and for the first time I see fear in their eyes. “…Just as I plan to do with you.”

                The blood from my palms sinks into the surface of the wood. Just as I had did before I fainted, I concentrate all my aggression on them and allow the energy that burns through me to seep in my veins. All I see in the back of my mind is their deaths. A terrible, broken and cold death.

                The carriage is struck hard from my side; knock us all suddenly to the right of the carriage; instead of meeting wall, the carriage tumbles to the right. Briefly, I am floating in the middle of the carriage, touching nothing but air until I slam with a bang against one of the four walls of the carriage. All around me is chaos: horses are naying and grunting, the men screaming and banging just as I am, items fly about in and out of the carriage. The wood creaks and cries as it meets the side of the cliff.

                I’m swung back up into the air before I’m thrown back down into another part of the carriage. My leg snaps but I can’t feel the pain, I still see red. We roll and roll down the cliff; rocks tear open the carriage like paper. There isn’t a part of the carriage that I am not thrown against, not a part of me that isn’t cut, bruised or broken and through all this; I smile because these damn men are being torn apart.

                One of four is thrust out of the carriage through the front; all we are left with is his screams echoing behind us. Another silences, and when I get a glance of why, I see his head is split open and his eyes gaping out, mouth slightly open. He’s dead.

                For a second, the carriage stops rolling, I’m thrown to the top and then slam back down to the bottom when the cart hits something hard. It takes half a minute when the water starts to rush in through the opening.

                The water kisses my scratches and bruises and it burns. The water is cold, like ice and refreshing like death. I rest on my back just barely able to open my eyes when I see the fogginess start to grip at me once again. Near me I can still hear the last two demons groaning. I won’t die near them…

                My arms are unmoving; I can’t feel them other than the throbbing. My legs are the same except for one; with all my strength I use that single leg to kick my way out the back of the carriage and with the help of the swishing water, my body becomes light enough to do so. Once out, I float in the dark depths of the water, just barely able to see the cart as it sinks faster and faster taking the groaning men with it. Above me the sky is still cloudy, but I can see the moon shining through.

                The fogginess grows and grows, encircling the single light I have left. Excruciating pain rips through my body as the red fades. Pulses like thunder tear through me with every heart beat and sudden sadness envelopes me. My eyes well up with tears. The water embraces me but doesn’t let me drown.

                I know I will faint soon…I know I will drown here….I can trust the ocean though; after all it was the ocean that led me to Sesshomaru. I can feel safe now, for the last time, wrapped up in the sea.

                The moon disappears from my view….but I still can’t help but smile.

                Safe…


End file.
